


HYPNOS, LAY YOUR SECRET DOWN

by Nyeogmi



Category: Hades (Video Game 2018)
Genre: Angst, Educational, Humor, Hypnotism, Implied Relationships, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-23
Updated: 2020-11-23
Packaged: 2021-03-10 07:53:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,662
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27679690
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nyeogmi/pseuds/Nyeogmi
Summary: Sing, o Muse, of the loneliness of Hypnos, Nyx's undignified son. Her most famous child. The thought of one man's gaze drew his heartstrings tight, and that was all.There are burdens no man or god should carry. What Hypnos knows could destroy him or complete his budding romance. What he refuses to say would fill a manuscript. His silent tears could ink a thousand pages.
Relationships: Hypnos/Zagreus (Hades Video Game), Orpheus/Zagreus (Hades Video Game)
Comments: 7
Kudos: 33





	HYPNOS, LAY YOUR SECRET DOWN

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Radium_225](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Radium_225/gifts).



His chaise was divine.

Nobody loved him when he was awake. Hades especially. The bats understood what it was like to be used as a statue, but they, unlike Hypnos, could be touched by Zagreus.

Zagreus rose from the waters. Hypnos floated as powerlessly as a bubble gum balloon.

_It's lovely to see you, Zag._ Ahem. _Delicious as usual, Zag._ He blushed a darker shade of gray. Statuesque indeed.

"Soul Catcher," he read from his list. He had a secret that could not and would not be expressed. "Those butterflies won't leave you alone, will they?" _And neither will I._

He gulped and swallowed.

_Don't tease me, Zag._ As if Zagreus even could. Zag had more affection for the fish he caught in the Styx. He and the Prince could never be together.

Wordlessly, Zag stormed off. Achilles would be hearing about this, Hypnos thought, embarrassed. How had he been so forward?

Or had his comments remained within his own handsome head? 

More likely, he thought, Achilles wouldn't hear anything about him at all.

"Bats," he said, levitating. He pressed his face between the bars of the cage. "I don't know how to love him."

They chittered and skreeked. Bats had their own secrets.

The scent of raw onions and pomegranate wafted from the kitchen. The foods of the dead. He wanted to lie like a dead fish on the countertop, surrounded by the stench of his own failure.

"Nobody will ever love you, Hypnos," said Megaera.

He wanted to bite into _her_ like a raw onion.

Sing, o Muse, of the loneliness of Hypnos, Nyx's undignified son. Her most famous child. The thought of one man's gaze drew his heartstrings tight, and that was all.

Sing of the heartache that cost Zagreus constant happy days of affection. Start from when the two diverged in strife and Hypnos went to drink the wine of the god of death.

He was unhappy indeed.

When the gods themselves were miserable, they took out their anguish in cruel sport against mortal men. Dionysus with drink and animal skins; Apollo with his bow that caused sickness. Megaera with her whip. Except for the wine, Hypnos was barehanded.

"You're making me miserable," he told her.

"Funny. There's not a fury for making people miserable."

"You've murdered my appetite." He poured out the wine on the counter. "Can't you see I'm inconsolable?"

"Go cry to Mom."

Impartial Night stood at the Prince's bedroom door and said nothing.

Someday -- he had no idea when that day might come -- he would reveal his secret and everybody, even the Prince, would reckon with the fact that he had been far more than he appeared to be. Hypnos would reciprocate those unfeeling gestures he had foolishly taken as courtship. He would reciprocate them one hundred times over.

But not until spoken to, afraid as he was to speak without being spoken to. He would hover like a balloon, one toe extended to the ground -- spinning like a top once-awakened. He would catch the heel of Zagreus' burning foot as he sprinted off to speak to Achilles or to catch Thanatos in the ballroom.

Sing, o Muse, of Sleep's abandonment and the fiery toes of the burning Prince.

In a wave of heat that would make Hephaestus sweat, Hypnos blushed. Barreling towards him like the boulder of Sisyphus was the Prince already -- green eye twinkling, red one smoldering. Varatha in hand, proud enough to charge into battle. Resolute against evil forces, like Dad.

Hypnos didn't have a dad. He had Erebus, a dimension of darkness.

He stood in the darkness of the bedroom door, transparent, like a ghost in the hellish tomb, like the bedsheets on the wall.

"You're not one of Father's minions," Zagreus said. "Move along."

"Your dog needs feeding."

Momentary concern flashed across the red and green eyeballs of the chthonic Prince.

"Feed him yourself," he said.

"You don't _mean_ that," Hypnos wheedled. "There's nothing you love more than that adorable pup. And I know it too! I love him just as well."

"You love my pup."

"Don't pretend you haven't noticed! He trudges up the Styx each time you leave him --"

"And I suppose you bid my pup farewell," he said. "And you love my bats."

"Possibly, Zagreus!"

"You're... fond of them?"

"I relate to them," Hypnos said. "We're far too cognizant of what it's like to live inside a cage."

"And I know your secret," says Zagreus.

Hypnos blushed again. This time there was nearly color inside his cheeks.

It was impossible for Zagreus to know. Not even Dusa knew.

"And I want to discuss it inside my bedroom."

  
  


\----

"Quite right, Zagreus," Hypnos said, leading Zagreus down the corridor to his own bedroom.

Zagreus smirked. Yes, indeed, he realized. There was something else Hypnos was fond of.

The look of utter disgrace on Hypnos' face gave him pause to continue.

"Lie down in bed," Hypnos said.

"Not tired," he said. He kept his legs bowed and stood, aflame, in the entryway. The mirror cut a course to infinite darkness on the left of him.

"I don't want you to see my face when I explain it," said Hypnos.

"Then let me guess." He grinned, sure to focus on the mirror to save Sleep his awkwardness. "Father says you've taken a liking to the nectar I've brought you. As a matter of fact, he says you'll get fat if I keep giving it to you."

"Quite right. Accurate, Zagreus. As usual --"

"But you haven't been drinking it at all, Hypnos."

He turned and saw Sleep's mouth open, surprised. Parched.

"There's someone you're trying to impress, isn't there?"

Hypnos cast his own colorful gaze into the mirror of darkness. It rested there like a fishing line as he remained in pensive thought.

"Hypnos," said Zag. The time had come to reveal Sleep's secret, and he relished the moment. It was time to leave all anxieties behind and step into the clear spotlight of honesty. "All the nectar in the world won't win her heart. Meg is your sister."

That was not Hypnos' secret.

Hypnos shuffled awkwardly on Zag's chthonic bedspread. It was disorderly -- bumpy, even.

"Oh, is it Orpheus?" Zag asked. "He's straight."

Hypnos wouldn't speak.

"Dusa's a head."

Hypnos had no interest in getting a head.

"Well, there's nobody else it could be..."

"Zagreus," Hypnos said. He looked like a popsicle recently rescued from the cold. "My secret isn't about Meg, or Orpheus, or Dusa..."

"Oh, it's about..."

Hypnos stripped the bedspread from the mattress, revealing 24 jugs of golden brown fluid.

"You never use it."

"The bed?"

"Your heart," said Hypnos. "Let me into it."

The Mirror of Night contained all the powers of Nyx, Hypnos' mom. Right now it was a swarm of endless swirling colors, jetting around like bees before a screen. The individual bees joined each other and synchronized, fast ones slowing, clusters making lines. Zagreus struggled to keep track -- at first it was impossible. His mind needed to relent against the sensory onslaught.

Then he recognized the seductive simplicity of the pattern. For every green bee, a blue one. For every blue bee a red one.

Three bees made white.

White bees made a sheet.

The void was as white as a sheet of paper.

On the sheet of paper was Hypnos' name and the phrase "SLIDE 1."

"What's it called?" Zagreus asked.

"A PowerPoint," Hypnos replied. "Because the points buzzing around in the display have been animated by the powers of Nyx."

That made sense to everybody.

"The title of the PowerPoint is 'HOW TO HYPNOTIZE PEOPLE REALLY FAST IN TARTARUS: A SLIDESHOW OF MY OPINIONS.'"

Zagreus understood.

"That is also the name of my secret."

He liked the idea of watching a slideshow of Hypnos' opinions.

The next slide of the slideshow contained a list of authors, but the only name on the list of authors was Hypnos.

The first section of the slideshow was called "Notes." The slide was white with black text, a thick black border that surrounded the edges of the slide, and comfortably-spaced text in a humanist sans serif font that was moderately corporate yet managed to make Zagreus feel empathized-with. Later, he thought, this font would be used to sell cell phones.

"For reasons of brevity," Hypnos said, "I've written this slideshow in the second person. 'I' is the subject, Zagreus, and 'you,' is the hypnotist." To Zagreus this made excellent sense. "Now, I've written this entire slideshow in my framework, Zagreus. I try to mark cases where I deviate from common knowledge and terminology, but since this entire document consists of my opinions and most of my evidence is anecdotal, you should watch yourself."

"You're really good at making slideshows, Hypnos," he said.

After so many trips into the underworld, he had never tried nectar. Today he thought he'd open a bottle, if nothing else, to open up room on the surface of his bed.

For once, he was sitting down. It was rare for him to do that.

"Now, Zagreus," he said. The screen said "Structure of a hypnosis scene," and a little beaded indicator had moved to the right to indicate that the slide was "section 1." There was a picture of a bat on this screen, but it didn't seem to have anything to do with the presentation.

Zagreus enjoyed bats.

"A hypnosis scene consists of pretalk, induction, trance, and an awakener. Those are the names of the parts." He added, parenthetically, that -- "Nominally, these are separate parts, but if you're an experienced hypnotist with a familiar subject, it's pretty common to skip the pretalk and the induction."

Would Zagreus ever become an experienced hypnotist? Probably he could, if he paid attention to Hypnos' helpful slideshow.

"In the pretalk, you make small talk and converse with me -- that's 'me,' the subject, not me, the God of Sleep, Zagreus -- on the topic of 'here's what we're going to do in the scene.' The quiet purpose for you is to establish 'we're on the same side' and 'if you're worried, you can be worried now, rather than during the scene itself.'"

Zagreus didn't think it was possible to be worried while viewing such a lovely slideshow.

"Skipping pretalk is OK if you already know what I'm comfortable with, and I'm already OK with being hypnotized. But if you guess wrong, that's abuse, so be careful."

He said "abuse" with a tone of voice that indicated that abuse was very bad.

"In the induction, you move me from 'awake' to 'in trance.' At this point, it becomes inappropriate for you to ask me to do more activities than I already agreed to. Because my judgment is now compromised."

This recitation of the parts of a hypnosis scene had filled Zagreus with enthusiasm to watch the rest of the slideshow -- an enthusiasm that was increasing with every slide.

"In the trance, you make lots of suggestions about what I'll do, feel, and believe. I respond to them automatically. You can have a lot of fun with me this way!" Having fun with Hypnos was an appealing thought. "But in the awakener, you return me to normal. You suggest that I won't be following any suggestions from the session, unless I asked you to leave me with some."

The idea of making any permanent change to Hypnos, even via the powers of suggestion, made Zagreus uncomfortable, and he agreed that it would be a bad idea to do something like that nonconsensually. After all, what if someone did something like that to _him_ nonconsensually? Could there be people who could even stomach the thought?

"Now -- the next slide is about the inviolable rules of hypnosis," Hypnos said, advancing the slide.

The nectar tasted good, but what tasted even better was the knowledge Zagreus stood to gain by carefully observing the presentation as it continued, taking diligent mental notes as he opened another delicious bottle.

"These are the inviolable rules of hypnosis, and if you violate them, you're an abuser."

The rules, one by one --

"Never attempt to hypnotize me without prior consent."

Zagreus nodded.

"Don't suggest any 'out-of-session' things unless I specifically agreed to them outside of trance."

That, too, earned a nod from Zagreus.

"In particular, unless I ask, don't have me permanently change in any way, lose memory of the session, send you pictures of myself, refer to you on chthonic social media -- in my profile or in my posts -- lose the ability to come, lose the ability to go into trance, crave further play with you, believe you're my master or my owner, or hold any triggerphrases, even cute ones. Also, don't tell me that I'm bad, wrong, or shameful, unless I explicitly ask for that. And wake me immediately if I ask you to. And if any suggestion ever makes me uncomfortable, tell me I don't have to do it."

A third Zag-nod revealed his total agreement with rule 3. He was willing to observe the consent norms of the hypnosis community, and grateful to Hypnos for making such an excellent slideshow.

"I'm sure you recognize that most subjects will wake in response to violations of these rules, Zagreus. But even if you were to get away with them, you would be being a bad person."

He knew that it would be wrong to break those rules. It would even be wrong to hypnotize his dad into letting him escape from the Temple of Styx, unless his dad had consented to that specific act in advance. No meant no, after all.

"Here's some general good advice. You may be able to flout it with experience, Zagreus, but chances are, if you're not following it, you will cause problems and may hurt someone. Are you listening?"

Zag loved rules.

"Make sure you and I are both hydrated, Zagreus. Don't hypnotize me in front of people who didn't agree to see that. Don't become my owner or master unless you have time for me -- harems are bad, by the way. And figure out exactly what I want. For instance, specific acts such as memory play or emotion play are things you should ask about individually. And you should make sure to check if I have a time limit. Also, be sure to determine whether I'm worried about being interrupted -- by Meg, for instance, who I do not have a crush on -- and whether I have noise concerns."

The thought of Hypnos screaming was so pleasing to Zagreus' mind that he knew that he would have to get clearance in advance if he were going to affect a screaming trance via the potent, mysterious art of hypnosis.

"Now, when you wake me up, always be sure to clear out the suggestions you gave me."

There was another picture of a bat in the slideshow which was good because sometimes if there was no picture of a bat Zagreus worried he might begin to find the slideshow boring, even though it remained, as it was before, a rollercoaster of emotions that engaged all the senses, including taste, as he took another sip from the jug of nectar

"You can memorize a sentence like this one, which I use: 'In a moment I'm going to tell you to wake for real, and when I do that, you won't be holding any of my suggestions, and you'll be able to respond to me like I never hypnotized you.'" A very good sentence. "The ritual's not important. Getting all the parts is. Now, if you want someone to hold onto a suggestion, you can say 'except' and list it explicitly. Everything else should always be removed. And, one other thing -- this is also important. After intense play, after waking me up, don't leave until I'm feeling good and you're feeling good."

That was a good slide.

"Remember," said Hypnos, "that my judgment may be compromised immediately after waking. So, you shouldn't ask me to do additional things until fifteen minutes or so have passed. Speak to me in a normal voice about waking-world things to wake me faster. Teasing or toying with me after the session resets this timer."

The next slide was brown with a manila background, but as Zag's eyes adjusted to the light, it began to look black with a white background instead, like before.

"The induction," said Hypnos. "In the unhypnotized state, I experience internal objections that prevent me from responding to suggestions. If you told me I was a jug of nectar, I'd probably think 'no I'm not,' or 'that's stupid,' and then I wouldn't think I was a jug of nectar. In the hypnotized state, I wouldn't experience that thought, so I'd think I was a jug of nectar. The induction is the process that moves me to the hypnotized state."

Before Zagreus could respond by nodding, he added, parenthetically, "Some people won't experience those objections from their ordinary waking state. Those people can be treated as 'always hypnotized' and you should be very careful with them. Other people quickly self-hypnotize when they hear something they recognize as a suggestion. With those people you can get by with a very simple induction, or just a mood-setting prelude."

Learning about hypnosis was even more fun than being hypnotized might have been if Zagreus knew what it felt like.

"In an induction, you make a series of asks of me, moving from small ones to large ones. These asks are intended to ease my critical thoughts, usually by --"

This slide was a list. The bullet points were little hearts, proving that Hypnos loved him. There were six little hearts, which stood for "ZAGREUS" spelled without the U.

"By giving you an authoritative role, then telling me what to do or think -- authoritarian hypnosis. Or by having me do things which convince me 'I'm definitely hypnotized,' undercutting my internal criticism -- placebo. Or by using verbal tricks and rhetoric to undercut my objections so that your suggestions will stand -- fast talk."

He spoke quickly but precisely. Hypnos' talk was never too fast for Zagreus.

"Or by having me do things I wouldn't normally do, so my ordinary thoughts won't come to mind -- permissive hypnosis 1. Or by encouraging me to stop observing rules that aren't about my objections, with the side effect that rules leading to my objections won't be observed any more -- permissive hypnosis 2. Or by encouraging me to enter states similar to dissociative states I've entered in the past -- permissive hypnosis 3."

The fact that there were three different ways to do permissive hypnosis was very interesting to Zagreus.

"Interestingly, some people, after experiencing hypnosis, will lose some of their objections but not all of them. Those people might need more coaxing than others, or, in the case of permissive hypnosis, they might need to be encouraged to stop observing specific kinds of rule."

Zagreus liked the sound of Hypnos' voice when he was delivering a slideshow. This was the best slideshow Zagreus had ever seen. He liked PowerPoints.

The next slide came with the sound of a duck. Were the powers of Nyx's mirror limitless?

"In my personal framework, there are two internal mechanisms that object to suggestions. One is dedicated to conventional behavior and recognizing authority figures, so it responds well not only to the hypnotist being authoritative, but also to the hypnotist encouraging the person to break away from their conventional behavior. A second mechanism is dedicated to rational thinking, and it gets stopped up by fast talk and the direct evidence I get from responding to placebo."

He went on. "My main advice for getting better at inductions is to read a lot of people's hypnosis content -- scripts, et cetera -- and then try to break it down based on how long it is, what voice it's written in, whether it uses devices like metaphor and analogy, whether the trance happens gradually or turns on a surprise, and what activities it includes. Doing this means you'll be able to take an arbitrary passage of hypnosis script and be able to recognize common activities, but distinguish them by other features. You'll likely notice, for instance, that almost all fast inductions share similar patter."

Zagreus couldn't wait until he knew enough about hypnosis to notice this.

"You'll likely notice too that a lot of hypnosis scripts include long passages of poetic-looking text with no obvious purpose. Why? I don't know! If you find out, tell me. I theorize it's there to impress the hypnotist. However, a friend of mine --" Cerberus? Zag was curious. "-- tells me that he goes into 'autopilot' when exposed to that sort of thing, and it has a similar effect on him to relaxing imagery."

"That's so cool!" Zagreus exclaimed.

"Working from scripts is fine, incidentally, but most people never have to work from them, and folks who do will lose their dependence on scripts pretty quickly if they challenge themselves."

The next slide was called "Trance," and on it, in deepest stygian black, was a picture of a bat.

"Yes!" said Hypnos, although Zagreus had not said anything. "Now. If I'm able to accept suggestions that I used to object to automatically, that means I'm in trance!"

Zag was excited!

"Generally, if I'm in trance and you tell me something is true, I'll believe it. If you tell me to do something, I'll do it. You can influence my feelings by telling me what I'm going to feel like. You can suggest whatever you'd like, and if you can describe it in language, most of it will become true for me."

That sounded very cool. 

"I'm aware of what's going on and will usually wake myself up if you suggest anything I wouldn't like. However, you shouldn't rely on that, and you should always make sure _before_ hypnotizing me that you know what I'm OK with."

Of course -- it was very important to be respectful of Hypnos' intentions, and it would be very bad to hypnotize someone without permission, Zagreus thought. He liked drinking nectar and watching a PowerPoint.

"If I've gone into trance, you might find that there are some suggestions I'm not receptive to. Becoming more receptive to suggestions is called 'going deeper.' Depth, of course, is a purely subjective thing. There's no reliable way of determining depth, and while some people will reject some suggestions, there are no strictly 'easy' or 'hard' suggestions. People who are deeper in trance feel less restrained and they respond to a greater range of suggestions."

The concept of hypnotic depth was interesting to Zagreus.

"I personally think depth is a useful concept if you use dissociation as a main tool to do hypnosis, but it's less useful for people who rely on tools like placebo. Despite that, I recommend doing fractionation with basically everyone, and 'depth' is a useful element in explaining it."

Hypnos hadn't explained fractionation yet, but Zagreus knew that Hypnos was always very thorough about explaining his terminology and that meant that eventually Zagreus would be very complete in his understanding of all aspects of how hypnosis worked.

"Many people intuitively know what it would feel like to go 'deeper' into trance and will do it on their own if you suggest it. However, some people will feel that they've hit a maximum depth level. For those people, there's tricks to use. Visualizations about being in a darker place -- a place with fewer things, a place that is down a set of stairs, or a place that is more calm. There's also fractionation: the technique of bringing the person 'up' and 'down,' having them alternate between two different emotional states, or alternating triggerphrases introduced early in the session with triggerphrases introduced late in the session."

Zagreus didn't think that any "up" or "down" could compete with the roller coaster ride of this presentation. Already he'd learned so many new words and concepts that he felt as if he could hypnotize everyone in the world with his powerful mind alone. Yet there were still more slides and that meant there was even more excitement that awaited.

And section five was just about to begin! (It was actually the sixth section, because the first section was section 0.)

"Tricks for getting people to do stuff that wouldn't normally work," Hypnos intoned, with a reverence and unrestrained joy in the subject of hypnosis. "Cuing suggestions -- time. Sometimes you'll say 'you're going to close your eyes' and even though I'm feeling suggestible, I won't do it." 

That problem sounded vexing.

"Now, some hypnotists have a complicated excuse for this. Supposedly my 'unconscious mind' only understands the present tense. As far as I can tell, that is a ridiculous lie made up by idiots. I think a more likely explanation is that, when you say that, it's not always clear to me that you want me to do it _now_. Sometimes your syntax will leave that ambiguous -- maybe you'd like me to do it at some unspecified time in the future."

Even fully understood, Zagreus just couldn't imagine what it would take to address that problem, but then, as promised, the roller coaster picked up on its swerve again and carried him into the heights of explanatory ecstasy.

"Saying 'now you're going to close your eyes' deals with that ambiguity handily! I usually use the phrase 'now you're going to...' every time I want a suggestion to be followed right away; the phrase 'when I X, you're going to...' when I want to set up a suggestion to be followed later, and the phrase 'in a moment, you're going to...' when I'm offering an explanation of a suggestion that's going to be followed after an immediate cue."

Of course!

"Cuing suggestions. (automatism)" Hypnos coo'ed, reading the PowerPoint from the mirror display. "Yes. Intentional behavior, as you know, is stuff you do on purpose, Zagreus. Automatic behavior is behavior that happens without conscious thought. Now, quite a lot of newbie hypnotists will have trouble making it clear whether they want the other person to do something automatically. It's common for them to imply that _everything_ the other person does should be automatic, including intentional gestures like closing their eyes at the beginning of a session."

Zagreus didn't want to make that same mistake.

"Generally, if you want someone to do something on purpose, you should phrase it as a command: 'Close your eyes.' For certain commands, like 'Go to sleep,' it doesn't make very much sense to do this, because I can't go to sleep intentionally."

Zagreus knew what it was like not to be able to go to sleep intentionally.

"Now, if you want me to do something automatically, you can phrase it as a declarative sentence. Usually the subject of the sentence is something other than me, the person: 'Your eyes are going to close.' For some suggestions, of course, you're grammatically required to refer to me directly, and that's fine: 'Now you're going to go to sleep.'"

Of course.

"If I've carried out a suggestion at least once during a session. I can usually do it again just by being told. 'Go to sleep again' works fine if I agree I was already asleep sometime earlier."

Zagreus liked this slide almost as much as the other slide from earlier.

"As a subject, when I'm engaged in automatic behavior, I usually don't do things spontaneously. To recover some spontaneous behavior, you can use the 'parts' method, then emphasize that I have preferences of my own which govern the other things I do. 'Now the part of you that speaks is coming back up, but the rest of you is staying down there. You can say whatever you like.'"

But there was nothing Zagreus wanted to say when he was confronted with such a high-quality presentation.

"Visualization," said Hypnos. "Drawing on people's internal imagery usually works better than using detailed descriptions. Poetic language is usually dead language. You can cue me to see something by imagining that something is coming into view and referring to it without describing it. 'Oh, what's that? There it is! You seem to like it a lot!' And once I agree with you that something is coming into view, you can add details to change my perception. 'Is it a man? Are his feet burning? Does he have a spear?'"

Zagreus thought his spear was a good spear.

"Oh, and this is a given. When you suggest a detailed pattern of behavior to me, that's something I can imagine before carrying it out. Therefore, you can use similar trickery to put me into that imaginative frame of mind. 'Oh gosh, what's going on in your head?' -- and, after assent -- 'If you're not careful, you might start squirming!"

The next slide was the same color as the previous slide. "Doubling down on a reaction," Hypnos said. "When I audibly or visibly react to something, you can say 'more' or 'you'll double that.' I can't deny it, because you saw me do it."

Right.

"In general, if I'm already doing something, you can modify the manner I do it in. You can also ask me to carry over the intensity of one behavior into another behavior. 'Look at how hard you're laughing. In a moment you're going to be panting just as hard.' Oh, and giving me a time-scopped triggerphrase, then triggering it multiple times within the time limit is a sneaky way to suggest doubled or tripled effects."

Yes.

"Language tricks. There's just a lot of these! If you say 'you're already X, so you'll Y,' that will remind me I'm complying with you. That means I'm more likely to respond when you tell me to Y. You can also say 'you'll X, because...' No matter what follows 'because,' that's generally more effective than saying 'you'll X,' because..."

He cleared his throat.

"Toss me some nectar?"

Zag tossed him some nectar because the presentation was so good.

"Thank you!" He drank the nectar. "Because by the time you get to 'because,' I'm assuming the thing that comes after 'because' will be a good reason."

What a good slideshow!

The next section -- section 6 -- was called "Induction activities."

"Most hypnotists have a couple pet inductions they pull out," said Hypnos. "They do these without much variation. These usually consists of multiple activities, basically for the reasons that" -- He raised a finger -- "Most hypnotists don't have confidence that their favorite activities will work for a subject who's 'cold.' (completely unhypnotized)" He raised another finger. "Most hypnotists expect an induction to last longer than any particular activity. For instance, the 'your eyes are stuck closed' activity can be done in about a minute, and inductions that take less than a minute are not very popular among inexperienced hypnotists. Aside from that, most subjects expect a certain amount of effort to be spent. They may need a little time to put themselves into their ideal headspace, and they may not feel like the hypnotist has spent enough effort if the induction is too fast."

Zagreus thought that made sense, and that if he found success with a ten-minute induction, it's likely he might never switch to a faster one -- even if a faster one was more likely to lead to success.

"Most hypnotists will start their induction with an activity that they're pretty sure will earn a response from waking. Usually this response is pretty small -- for relaxation, it's a few easy commands that earn rapport. Then they'll move onto an activity that draws heavily on hypnosis tropes, and after completing the activity, they'll declare their subject to be in trance. Often trance was achieved earlier, but the call is technically accurate."

Zagreus agreed with Hypnos who he thought was making a lot of sense.

"You can stick to this structure for now, and many hypnotists never move outside of it, but you might have fun in the future if you deviate from it. You can do seven of your favorite activities, or you can start with an activity you never do 'cold' and see it work. Stuff usually works better than you expect it to, and this will increase your confidence in that activity in general."

Yes!

"Now," said Hypnos, apologetically. "This next section is a little bit long."

Zagreus didn't mind.

"I want to list a bunch of induction activities here for two reasons. Reason one," he said, lifting another finger, "is that knowing what the big categories of activity are might help you out with parsing other people's content. You can scrape it for active ingredients and stuff like that."

Zagreus watched Hypnos' other finger as it lifted.

"The bigger thing I care about here is that this stuff might give you ideas. You're likely to look at any two of my thoughts, Zagreus, and think 'oh, wait, I've got a way to combine these!' Or maybe you'll realize you can shave off the second half of an activity and substitute a different one. Oh, and on another note," he said, lifting another finger, "I do think some activities done in inductions are not useful except for placebo."

He advanced the slide. This slide had a picture of a bat on it.

"Practically anything can be useful for placebo, and there's a few specific placebo activities that are really common and useful, so I want to single out and include them. But there are also a lot of placebo-only activities that are promoted on a One Weird Trick sort of basis. I'm intentionally not going to list anything that I think is promoted as a magic bullet despite being placebo-only and average or poor in effectiveness."

Zagreus knew what magic bullets were because of Hestia's gun that he fired magic bullets out of.

"Anecdotally, a lot of those supposed magic bullets seem to exist in the vague surroundings of NLP. And I tend to see verbal confusion induction people make claims like this a lot, which tends to bug me because I, for one, don't believe those claims at all, Zagreus!"

Yes, Zagreus thought.

"Activity one: making hypnosis seem less mysterious," said Hypnos. "You tell me that hypnosis is similar to other states I've been in in daily life. You remind me that I may not feel different from usual when hypnotized, since many people don't. You remind me that I'll be able to wake at any time, and I'll be able to control what I respond to."

"Activity two: visualization," he said. "You tell me to imagine a bunch of things happening. This could be a metaphor for going into trance -- descending stairs -- or it could describe things that remind me of trance effects, like floating on the surface of a pool, or daydreaming. Or it could be a short story that is literally about a thing hypnotizing you -- Lernie, for instance!"

Lernie was a giant snake and Zagreus did not like giant snakes.

"Activity three: relaxation. You tell me to relax my body or my mind. Relaxed people usually feel like they don't have to do anything. A lot of people find it easier to relax their body than to relax their mind, so clarifying exactly what you want me to relax is a good idea."

"Activity four: permissive talk. You say 'you don't need to do X' or 'you can Y.' When you use this kind of language, it implies I don't have to follow certain rules. If you tell me I don't have to follow some rules, I'll feel less like I have to follow other rules."

"Activity five: double binds. You prompt me with something that seems to invite more than one response, but all of the responses presuppose that I'm going to go into trance. For instance, the question 'Are your eyelids heavy yet?' has yes or no answers, and both imply that soon, they will be."

"Activity six: truisms. You tell me something about myself that I can't easily say no to, such as 'you're breathing' or 'you're listening closely.' Sometimes you refer to an activity you suggested to me that I'm still doing, such as visualizing, relaxing, or keeping my eyes closed."

"Activity seven: yes sets. You tell me a series of truisms, then something that isn't a truism, but has the same syntactic form. I say 'yes' to it internally without thinking about it. You may interrupt me before I can vocalize a 'no,' then give me another suggestion."

"Activity eight: utilization. You mention what I'm doing and talk about how it's fine. You tell me to do the same thing in a tweaked form. 'More zealously,' for instance, or 'more slowly,' or 'after a delay,' or 'exactly when I tell you.' This allows me to think of the thing I was already doing as part of my response to trance."

"Activity nine: confusing talk. You speak in nonsense sentences, puns, or maybe you use complicated grammar with lots of clauses. You mention contradictory concepts, like feeling empty space, or seeing blankness. Often your language doesn't make sense at all. Ideally, I'm so preoccupied with untangling this that I'm susceptible to suggestions hidden underneath. But frankly, I think this is placebo for most people."

"Activity ten: overload. You tell me to think about a large number of things at once, with the idea that I'll be overwhelmed. The idea is that either I'll be too preoccupied to reject your suggestions, which I think is a placebo notion -- or you'll tell me to stop and then give me an additional suggestion that tags along. "Now you'll think of only one thing and sleep." I'm not sure if this latter option is placebo, Zagreus!"

Zagreus didn't know.

"Activity eleven: physiological tricks. You give me suggestions that don't sound contradictory on the surface, but for physiological reasons, I can't actually carry them all out at the same time. For instance, you might suggest that I relax my cheeks, my upper eyelid, and my jaw, then hold that position -- then you tell me to try to open my eyes. This won't work, and because you said I should _try_ to open my eyes, you're implying I'll fail to do so."

Hypnos advanced the slide again. "Activity twelve: You suggest something to me very early and for placebo reasons, I respond. Often this is 'your eyes will stick shut,' or 'your hands will come together,' 'your arm will lift,' or 'your fingers will go numb.' This works on me and proves to me that I must be hypnotized. Don't knock this, by the way, Zagreus! It works on most people, especially if you get rapport by giving them a few commands to follow first!"

This next slide was also very good. "Activity thirteen. Pattern interrupt, one. You tell me, or nonverbally direct me, to do a series of complicated or confusing things, until I go from anticipating your moves to passively observing them. This routine may include verbal suggestions about timing, like 'not yet!' delivered hastily after another suggestion. The nonverbal side of this often involves you jerking me around by my arm or by my hair until I can't predict your movements any more."

"Activity fourteen: pattern interrupt, two. You set up a predictable pattern -- for instance, by counting or telling me to respond to a command phrase by saying a different phrase. Then you break it by doing something unexpected. For instance, you might tell me that every time you press on my right hand, Zagreus, I'll press on your left one. Then you suddenly drop your left hand before I have time to! And when you finish the pattern, you deliver another suggestion at the same time or immediately after."

"Activity fifteen: fast fractionation. As I previously told you, you bring me up and down very quickly. You could brief me each time, or you could say '1, 2, 3, come up, 1, 2, 3, come down' until I catch onto the pattern. You could also say 'every time you blink, you'll go down, and when your eyes open up again, you'll be back up.' You can usually fractionate me a lot faster, or at the same time as other activities, if you attach it to another behavior. Most fast fractionation routines set the other person up for a pattern interrupt instead of the final 'come down' suggestion."

Zagreus never wanted this to stop. He had drunken so much nectar but he was even more drunk on the wisdom Hypnos had imparted using the PowerPoint.

"Yes!" said Hypnos. "You're such a good student, Zagreus! And I wanted to end my presentation with a little bit of general good advice that I think most hypnotists underplay."

Zagreus was excited!

"Yes! Now listen very closely. For one thing, hypnosis isn't sleep. They're probably not related to each other. But hypnotizing people and telling them they'll sleep will usually still work. Also, you can experiment as much as you want! And keep in mind that a lot of hypnosis advice says 'you can't do X' or 'X won't work.' Try X anyway! On average, resources that say this sort of thing are wrong. Also, keep in mind -- for most subjects, fast inductions work as well as slow ones. This includes subjects who are very new to hypnosis. Also, you can do 'trance' activities inside the induction! Try telling me I'm a jug of nectar when we're 30 seconds in! Also, moving from suggestion to suggestion quickly puts off the vibe that you don't think any single suggestion is critically important, which can reduce stress for a lot of subjects. Also, don't refer to subjects as 'your subs' unless they're in an exclusive relationship with you, Zagreus. Also, remember! Most people unwittingly front-load the part of an activity that actually works. If you want to do something faster, try cutting off the tail end of it! Although if the tail end is a punchline, you should cut the middle instead. Remember, cutting things makes you sound more confident! You really don't need to carry any activity to its conclusion. You can switch at any time! And if you're trying to think of how to hypnotize me into doing something unusual, think of how you'd convince me it's already happening. Oh! And remember, Zagreus -- a lot of people don't realize how zoned out they were during the session until they've woken up. Giving people an early "wake up" will often help you drive home this impression. You can then bring them down again and expect far more compliance once they've realized 'oh! I was in a really weird state.' And be sure to make your content match your delivery. 'Conversational' hypnosis involving ten minutes of uninterrupted monologuing is unlikely to scan as 'conversational,' although egalitarian language is a plus for a lot of people. Poetic language for no reason is likely to confuse people. Oh, and remember, one way to get a pattern interrupt is to think of a prop that can be used two ways, imply that _one_ mode of use leads gradually into trance, then suggest its other mode of use. For instance -- a candle that burns down gradually can be blown out. A pendulum that swings real fast can be dropped. Also, remember, people respond way better if they think you're paying attention to them! Also, since you've been paying close, close attention, Zagreus, good news! You can probably hypnotize people now. It's not that hard to do! And if anyone's ever implied to you that they have a secret weapon that they refuse to tell you about, please remember -- I, Hypnos, have made a general hobby of trying to discover the secrets of people who refuse to tell me their secrets, especially about hypnosis, so broadly, every secret weapon I'm currently aware of appears in this slideshow that I've just given you. Do you understand?"

Zagreus understood. He understood so well that he shifted sideways to make a space beside himself for Hypnos to sit.

He put a strong hand on the side of the bed and the bottles of nectar rolled off the side. Then they were a pile on the floor. Hypnos sat. The two were looking at each other, but they weren't saying anything.

I felt that I should leave the room.

"There's no need for that," said Zag. "See that lyre over there."

"... Master?"

"Play."

I plucked the string once. A note at a time would be a melody. More than one would be harmony.

Zagreus and Hypnos were also a harmony. It reminded me of the harmony between myself and Eurydice.

"There's one bottle of nectar left," Zag said.

I took it and I looked straight into his eyes.

"I fear you've misunderstood, Master."

"There's no misunderstanding, Orpheus. The two of us are friends. Hypnos and I are also friends. Hypnos has given me back this nectar, so... I thought it should go to you."

"That's not the issue, Zagreus. You said that I was straight. After the companionship the two of you just showed me... I'm no longer sure of that."

"But you love Eurydice, don't you?"

He put a hand into Hypnos' hair.

"I love her very deeply, Zagreus. And I thank you for speaking to Eurydice on my behalf, but love, as it is..."

"Sit with us."

"Love like yours should be told in songs, Zagreus."

"You're scared."

"I'm inspired, Zagreus."

"Are you going to write a song about us?"

"I think I might."

Hypnos' head lifted. "H-hey -- nobody's ever written a song about _me_ before!"

Zag wrapped a hand around his chin. "Then it's going to be your first. That right, Orpheus?"

"... Yes, I think that's how I'd prefer to do it. And Hypnos...?"

I wanted to know if it was right with him.

It almost seemed he was stronger than Zag, the way he held his place. The intensity with which he told me what to do. I felt -- and continue to feel -- that it was important to get this exactly right.

"Everything in my exact words," Hypnos said.

_ Then that's how I'll do it. _


End file.
